2 straight weeks, players have been ejected for hitting Penn State’s contact-prone kicker

Penn State kicker Joey Julius likes to get into the action, and why shouldn’t he? He’s listed at 5’10 and about 260 pounds, giving him a certain presence that most college kickers lack. On Saturday against Maryland and against Minnesota the week prior, that led to trouble.

Here’s Maryland’s Isaiah Davis, who was ejected for the targeting high hit on a player who was clearly not actively involved in the play:

A week prior, here’s a hit Minnesota’s Jaylen Waters put on Julius after a second-half kickoff, which makes for at least the third time in a month that Julius has been the target of a special teamer trying to make a point, or something.

Waters was ejected for unsportsmanlike conduct, according to play-by-play logs. It was a high and unnecessary hit, though it doesn’t look like it meets the definition of targeting, and Julius has clearly approached kickoff coverage as more than a run-of-the-mill kicker. It’s still a heavy hit, anyway.

Above, Julius was merely running down the field after booting a kickoff to the Gophers, but he was mixing things up with Waters earlier on the game, too.

We can’t be sure what’s been said between the two, but it seems like it probably wasn’t nice. Julius took a shot from another Gopher previously.